Project Tiger ET- 9 Project Tiger Was Conceived in the Nascent Seventies, out of Concern for India’S Dwindling Wilderness
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Last Update: 4 November 2017 PART - II Project Tiger ET- 9 Project Tiger was conceived in the nascent seventies, out of concern for India’s dwindling wilderness. Its contribution has been substantial. Moreover, the journey through these years has been one of significant learning, providing an insight into the involved linkages between nature conservation and sustainable community development. This opens new avenues for a wide-based conservation effort with people’s support. To the ecologist of today, equally and justifiably, the tiger again is a symbol of the country’s wilderness. The flow of nutrients through the complex web of nature in the forest ecosystems, culminates in the tiger, Micro-organisms break up plant and animal residues to form humus which accounts for soil fertility. The resultant diverse vegetation provides food to herbivorous insects, birds and mammals, besides conserving soil and enriching water and weather regimes. Among a host of predators and scavengers that thrive on this productivity, the striped feline stands supreme in most of our forests. From the cold Himalayan high altitudes forests to the steaming coastal mangroves of the Sundarbans, from the scorched and scrublands of Rajasthan to the lush evergreens of the south, the northeast, and from the flat teral swamps to the rolling hard grounds of the peninsula, the tiger is very much at home. The will being of the tiger is thus synonymous with the health of the Indian wilderness. The architects of the Project, a special Task Force of the Indian Board for Wildlife, conscious of this, thus enunciated its objective: 1) “To ensure maintenance of a viable population of tiger in India and to preserve, for all time, areas of biological importance as a national heritage for the benefit, education and enjoyment of the people.” The Project was launched in 1973, and this concern and the direction were strongly reflected in the message for the occasion by the then Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi, who regarded it as a truly national endeavour and observed: 2) “The tiger cannot be preserved in isolation. It is at the apex of a large and complex biotope. Its habitat, threatened by human intrusion, commercial forestry and cattle grazing, must first be made inviolate.” Background An estimate placed the population of tigers in India at the turn of the century at 40,000. The first ever All India Tiger Census in 1972, however, revealed that only 1,827 survived. Even if the earlier figure was an exaggeration, the 1972 figure projected a dismal picture. Mounting demographic pressure, gathering momentum towards the latter part of the last century, led to progressive diversion of wilderness to agriculture. An awakened lust for shikar among the privileged hunters took a heavy toll of wild animals. The totalitarian controls of the colonial-feudal era, nonetheless, prevented the masses from such indulgence. In the post-Independence period even these controls crumbled. Private forests and village pastures were rapidly reclaimed for agriculture, direction rural pressure of small timber, firewood and grazing to hitherto sparingly utilised reserved forests. Hunting pressures both from villages and cities, legal and illegal, went up. This depleted the prey bases of the tiger. As prey became scarce for carnivores, they turned to killing cattle. In return the villagers poisoned the carnivores. Such shrinkage and depletion of the wilderness coupled with direct eliminative pressures caused all wild animal populations, including the tiger, to dwindle. At the IUCN General Assembly in Delhi, in 1969, serious anxiety was voiced about the threat to several rare species and wilderness areas in India. Things began to move thereafter because of an intensifying concern, spearheaded by the Indian Board for Wildlife. 1970 will be regarded as the cut-off year in the history of nature conservation in India. Wildlife had reached its lowest ebb by then, but at the same time the full implications of this devastation began to be felt. In 1970 a national ban on tiger hunting was clamped and in 1972 the Wildlife Protection Act came into force. The Project The Task Force, which was then formulating the Project, was convinced that the Project Tiger must conform to an ecosystem approach. But almost all the prospective tiger reserves were subject to ongoing human use, indeed overuse and abuse. Besides commercial forestry the habitat was depleted on account of overgrazing, rampant fires, impoverished water regimes and soil erosion. Interior settlements, on the one hand, contributed to this jeopardy while on the other, villagers suffered damage to their crops and cattle from the wild animals. The general scheme of the Project, therefore, involved setting up of several tiger reserves, each of which would include a ‘core’ area free from all human use and a ‘buffer’ area, in which conservation-oriented land use was to be allowed. The reserves were finally chosen so as to include as many bio-geographic types of areas as possible in the distribution range of the tigers in the country. The other consideration was the amenability of the specific area to concerted conservation action. Management plans were prepared for each reserve on the following principles: Elimination of all forms of human exploitation and disturbance from the core and rationalisation of such activities in the buffer; Limitation of the habitat management to repair damage done by man with the aim of restoring the ecosystem as close to its natural functioning as possible; Researching facts about habitat and wild animals and carefully monitoring changes in flora and fauna. Nine tiger reserves were established in 1973-74, with the pooled resources of the Central and State Governments. The forestry operations in the core areas were also abandoned, quickly bringing tranquility. Fieldwork for soil and water conservation and for habitat restoration commenced simultaneously. The effort was initially supported with vehicles, boats, wireless sets and other equipment received through WWF assistance. Later on it became a fully national endeavour with no external financial support. Technically it remained a religiously guarded Indian venture at all stages – conception, formulation and implementation. In the eventful years that followed, the original reserves were improved by enlarging the core and buffer areas and upgrading their legal status. Nine new reserves, two in 1979, four in 1983, one each in 1987, 1988 and 1990 have since been added, substantially enhancing the bio-geographic coverage of the Project. The Project in its 27 reserves now encompasses a gross area of 37,721 sq. km. Results The launch of Project Tiger with an ecosystem approach was in itself a landmark as this signified far- sighted recognition by the country’s leadership of the environmental ravages and of the need for urgent remedial action. In the tiger reserves, the intensive protection and habitat development effort registered striking successes. Fire protection and habitat development activity, while more intensive in the core areas, also covered the buffer areas. Restorative management and compensatory development resulted in rapid rejuvenation of habitat conditions in the reserves. The recovery of ground and field level vegetation was quick and phenomenal and if one entered a reserve from other adjacent forests, the difference was too obvious to be missed. Water regimes improved. With streams retaining their flow longer and some once-seasonal watercourses becoming perennial. Strikingly low monsoon-silt load in the streams of the reserves as compared to that in streams of adjacent areas signified the success of soil conservation measures. Fire protection not only led to increased fodder availability during the lean period in summer but also to formation of humus on the forest floor, resulting in increased organic activity, efficacious nutrient cycling and revitalized water regimes. The great lesson learn, in the journey through these years, is the realisation of an urgent need to restore the productivity of the depleted multiple use surrounds of wildlife reserves, through ecological development. This alone can usher compatibility between the reserves and the neighbouring communities, at present struggling for subsistence. This ultimately culminated in the launching of the ‘Eco-development Programme, In the buffer-area of the Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve in 1988-89. This in fact marks the second phase of the Project Tiger Scheme aiming at the creation of a satisfied human buffer around the tiger reserves. Monitoring Steering Committee constituted under the chairmanship of the Prime Minister regularly monitored the implementation of the Project Tiger. The guidelines for regulating tourism in tiger reserve, emphasis on the management of buffer areas, integration of local population through eco- development programmes, establishment of Nature Interpretation Centres and Veterinary Care Centres in the Reserves are the outcome of regular monitoring. All these new targets are yet to be’fully achieved, but the setting of well defined goals reflect the future course of Project Tiger. The above background points to the fact that the status of tiger in the country is an index of the ecological health of our wilderness and vindicates the relevance of the Project to our effort at environmental resurrection. Tiger Reserves in India SL.No. Year of Name of Tiger Reserve State Area in Tiger Creation Sq.Km. Population (1997) 1. 1973-74 Bandipur Karnataka 866 75 Nagarhole Karnataka 643 N.A. 2. 1973-74 Corbett Uttar Pradesh 1316 138 3. 1973-74 Kanha Madhya Pradesh 1945 114 4. 1973-74 Manas Assam 2840 125 5. 1973-74 Melghat Maharashtra 1677 73 6. 1973-74 Palamau Bihar 1026 44 7. 1973-74 Ranthambhore Rajasthan 1334 32 8. 1973-74 Simlipal Orissa 2750 98 9. 1973-74 Sundarban West Bengal 2585 263 10. 1978-79 Periyar Kerala 777 39 11. 1978-79 Sariska Rajasthan 866 24 12. 1982-83 Buxa West Bengal 759 32 13. 1982-83 Indravati Madhya Pradesh 2799 15 14. 1982-83 Nagarjunasagar Andhra Pradesh 3568 39 15.